Vodafone will allow customers to sync their bank cards to their Vodafone Wallet and use smartphones to pay for goods and services at contactless terminals, following a deal with Visa and Carta Worldwide.

The UK and Ireland accounted for more than 42 per cent of European FinTech investment in 2014, boosting Europe’s position as the fastest growing region in the world for investment in financial technology.

Santander has recently put $5m behind ‘MyCheck’, an app that makes it easier for consumers to pay their restaurant bill. The backing came from the bank’s Innoventures fund, which launched in July, to invest in early stage fintech startups.

Vodafone will allow customers to sync their bank cards to their Vodafone Wallet and use smartphones to pay for goods and services at contactless terminals, following a deal with Visa and Carta Worldwide.

Use of the Chinese yuan for international payments is in decline, falling to only the seventh most used currency with less than a 2% market share, according to data from the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT).